Politics, poetry and punchlineS
What form of communication fits you best? In our first project, spanning the entire semester, we were asked to answer this question. Whether poetry or comedy helped you communicate better. In order to decide, we started with poetry. We analyzed famous poems, and discovered poetry techniques such as sonnets and slam poetry. After writing and performing our own in a friendly competition, and writing personal poems for our groups, we moved to comedy. We practiced improv, watched video's of the pro's doing it, and also learned about skit comedy. After being assigned to groups, we wrote skits with themes similar to our poems, and then performed them with our groups. Next was politics. We were given the choice to express our opinions on illegal immigration, drone usage, and gay rights. I chose to analyze illegal immigration, because I had strong feelings on the matter. I feel as although illegal immigrants do contribute to society in many ways, it doesn't change the fact that they broke the law, and should therefore be given consequences. In order to express our opinions, we combined our classes. In humanities, we wrote research papers expressing our political views. In physics, we created cartoons on adobe illustrator expressing the same views. The cartoon had to have all 6 simple machines, as well as show conservation of energy, and projectile motion. Scroll down to see the final products of the project!
Poetry: Personal poem |
Oh me, Oh my, What do I spy, Behind those potted plants? It’s you I see, In love with me, writing letters of love with your hands. you’d cross a line, asking to dine, I’d reject even an offer of tea. Don’t you see, Its you and not me, I just don’t want your love? UN-RE-Quited you say, but to your dismay, You’ve got a better chance with a dove. |
Picture of Gabriel Malcolm(on right) and I practicing for skit.
|
Poetry: sonnetPoetry analysis: The RavenReflection: PoliticsPoetry & Punchlines: Reflection |
Beating out the lines for a new sonnet
finding answers in the side margins I pick out rhymes my thinking cap I don it Shakespeare was wrong it’s not a piece of pie running out of things to write about now the sky is blue and circling are birds if someone was good at this I would bow my head in prayer for I am out of words I’m on the last leg of this little race talking to Chan-man for he has finished his sonnet is being rubbed in my face I see the rod Bruce used to catch a fish its on the wall to which I face in fear I’m done I go now to help out a peer. “I was never insane except upon occasion when my heart was touched.” “The Raven” is 108 lines, about a man reading old books in a chair, at midnight in December. He hears someone tap at the door, but begins to drift of. After apologizing for taking so long, he goes to the door and finds emptiness. He whispers the name of his dead lover, “Lenore.” It echoes back, and he returns to his chair. He then hears another tapping, this time against the window. Believing it to be a branch, he opens the window, and in flies a raven. It perches on a bust of a greek god. He first asks the bird for it’s name. It replies with “nevermore.” As the narrator asks more and more questions, and gets more and more frantic, and the bird continues to answer with one word. “Nevermore.” He believes the bird to be the devil, and finishes with stating the the bird is still sitting on the bust of Pallas. In “The Raven”, by Edgar Allen Poe, the theme is that pain leads to insanity, which he creates by discussing topics of self torture, death, and insanity.
To see more, click for page 1, 2, or 3. In our politics project portion, I was able to get a deeper understanding of illegal immigration reform. Before, I hadn't really delved in to the topic. But after our project, doing lots of research, I feel as though my opinion can be backed by facts, and is personal, instead of passing off my parents opinion as my own. I also was able to learn more about physics, which I am glad I got the opportunity to do. This semester was my first real class on the subject, and I really enjoyed it. I liked learning about simple machines, and how to solve the equations for a lever. I also liked getting to use adobe illustrator, and hope to be able to use it, and learn lots more next semester.
I’m not very good at going into depth. Mrs. Janelle likes to say I’m a ‘wiggler” in my writing. I wiggle out of questions, summing up a full response in half the words. I give a baseline response, without including feelings, or just skimming the top. I’ll dip my toe into a question, and then pass it off to someone else, giving a follow up question.
The project we did, Poetry and Punchlines, required a lot of depth and personal opinions. I had a harder time than normal writing the different papers, and I spent extra time on it, rewriting my pieces to add more and more of my opinion. The first draft was all facts, but the final version was a lot more about me then I would have expected it to be. The project really brought me out of my comfort zone, and changed me for the better. To see the rest of the reflection, click HERE |
Below is my final product for the political portion, containing the research/political opinion essay, Rube Goldberg cartoon, and description of cartoon. For a larger image, click HERE